Bipolar disorder, also known as bipolar affective disorder, is a mood disorder. It used to be called manic depression. Bipolar disorder can cause your mood to swing from an extreme high to an extreme low. Manic symptoms can include increased energy, excitement, impulsive behaviour, and agitation.
Overview. Bipolar disorder, formerly called manic depression, is a mental health condition that causes extreme mood swings that include emotional highs (mania or hypomania) and lows (depression). When you become depressed, you may feel sad or hopeless and lose interest or pleasure in most activities.
Bipolar disorder is a serious mental illness that causes unusual shifts in mood, ranging from extreme highs (mania or “manic” episodes) to lows (depression or “depressive” episode). A person who has bipolar disorder also experiences changes in their energy, thinking, behavior, and sleep.
Anger is not an emotion that people typically associate with the up and down moods of bipolar disorder. Studies show, however, that individuals with this condition do experience more anger and aggression, and that these feelings are most intense during acute mood episodes.
Uncontrolled bipolar anger can evolve into rage, causing acts of unexpected aggression and furious outbursts.
Validate Your Loved One's Thoughts and Emotions
For example, disputing the thoughts of people with bipolar disorder and telling them to calm down when they are experiencing intense emotions can escalate symptoms. Instead, try to remain calm during these situations and recognize that their reality is true to them.
Binge eating, abusing drugs, smoking—there are many behaviors to deal with bipolar disorder symptoms that can lead to bad habits. But you can learn to break them.
Don't take comments or behavior personally. During periods of high energy, a person often says and does things that he or she would not usually say or do. This can include focusing on negative aspects of others. If needed, stay away from the person and avoid arguments.
One of the hallmark signs of mania is impaired judgment. This causes you to participate in extremely risky or dangerous behaviors. You do things without even considering the consequences of your actions. Gambling and hypersexuality are some of the risky behaviors linked to manic episodes.
If you have bipolar and wish to repair relationships damaged by your behavior (whether while symptomatic or not), it is vital to first recognize the other person's feelings and pain. Admitting to your actions and acknowledging the harm they caused your loved one is a good first step in the process of making amends.
While bipolar disorder and narcissistic personality disorder are two distinct mental health diagnoses, researchers have long noted a link between the two, including symptoms of setting excessively high goals and impulsivity. Other shared traits may include a lack of empathy, sleep deficiencies, and mood changes.
When a person with bipolar disorder is in conflict, they may struggle to respectfully and clearly communicate their issues and needs. They may lash out, name call, yell, and show aggression and drastic mood swings as they express themselves. Navigating conflict with someone reacting this way can be extremely difficult.
It is easy to become overwhelmed by the emotional rollercoaster caused by mood swings and other symptoms of Bipolar Disorder. A typical response, particularly immediately following an episode, is to shut down and temporarily avoid or ignore everything outside oneself in order to self-regulate.
People with Bipolar Disorder may struggle with maintaining a romantic relationship due to the many symptoms accompanying the diagnosis. Mania, and its potential for accompanying symptoms of depression, can hinder trust between the couple and make it challenging to communicate.
Grandiosity and overconfidence. Easy tearfulness, frequent sadness. Needing little sleep to feel rested. Uncharacteristic impulsive behavior.
These emotions have the potential to cause agitation, frustration, and general unhappiness. In order to deal with their emotional pain or to express their internal struggles, they may unintentionally lash out or say hurtful things.
A stressful circumstance or situation often triggers the symptoms of bipolar disorder. Examples of stressful triggers include: the breakdown of a relationship. physical, sexual or emotional abuse.
It's common for someone with bipolar disorder to hurt and offend their partner. When someone is first diagnosed, there are often relationship issues that need to be addressed. Couples counseling can help you: Understand that there's an illness involved in the hurtful behavior.
Bipolar people can be abusive, but then, so can non-bipolar people. The above notwithstanding, the extreme mood shifts of bipolar disorder may sometimes have a disinhibiting effect on abusive impulses that would otherwise not get expressed.
While there is no way to know whether West's behavior or comments are related to his mental health, most experts agree that people with bipolar disorder can behave erratically and may at times lose their “filter” and say or do socially inappropriate things.
People with bipolar disorder get mean and nasty during agitated downswings or dysphoric manias because this is a symptom of bipolar disorder. It's not okay, and it doesn't mean that we get to go around yelling and abusing people. But it's important to know we're not doing this on purpose.